Case Sensitive Filesystem on Mac Boot Disk == Bad Idea

Recently I bought and installed a 200GB 7200 RPM disk in my MacBook. The default 60GB 5400 RPM drive is a little slow. Plus I was running out of space. I figured I’d use the 60GB drive as a backup device.

When I went to re-install Leopard I noticed an option in the disk formatting options to format my disk as a HFS+ (case sensitive, journaled) file system. Being a Unix geek I’m pretty used to case-sensitive file systems so I turned the option on.

Very. Bad. Idea.

I’ve just noticed some of my installed apps don’t work. Ie, they crash on start-up. Adobe apps tend to be the worst offenders. It appears that not all Mac OS X apps are down with the “post modernism” of case sensitivity.

So, now I’m a bit stuck as my “backup” device, my old 60GB drive, isn’t big enough to hold all the crap that is now on my Mac’s HDD.

To resolve this situation I think I’m going to have to take a page out of JWZ’s book and get another 200GB HDD and run it as a “hot” spare. Or at least a Time Machine volume that is big enough to store all of my data. The 60GB I attached via USB isn’t really big enough to be a backup device.